Fertilizer Tariffs and International Trade Commission
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson. In a key move for fertilizer tariffs, the Senate Finance Committee advanced five of the president’s nominees to the International Trade Commission for confirmation.
In 2021, the ITC ruled Mosaic Fertilizer needed protection from Moroccan phosphate imports, even as Mosaic controlled 85% of U.S. phosphate production.
The resulting 18% tariff on fertilizer imports were finally suspended in June.
But Ag and Finance Senator Chuck Grassley says not before the damage was done …
GRASSLEY … “So, in just four years, family farmers have paid an additional seven billion dollars for their fertilizer, because of these tariffs.”
Grassley and other Senate Finance panel members, like Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden, hope the new nominees don’t favor firms that dominate an industry …
WYDEN … “This is where you stop the cheaters. This is where you go after the big people who are trying to rip off our businesses and our companies, and you stand up for American manufacturers and farmers.”
And for his growers, Wyden says that’s a big deal …
WYDEN … “The ability to sell ‘grown in Oregon’ beef, wheat, potatoes, and onions, both at home and overseas, is for those small businesses that I talked to over the last week, and literally, it’s a matter of survival.”
Wyden says he’d back all of Trump’s nominees, something he’d never done before, but it was needed now.
